The Official NYU Educational Theatre Blog

Category Archives: Student News

Post navigation

Congratulations to incoming EdD student and ETED alum Jamie Cacciola-Price for being one of the first recipients of the Empire State Excellence in Teaching Program which recognizes teachers across New York who are successfully preparing a new generation of learners for the future. The program honors outstanding individuals who exemplify the highest standards of teaching, working to foster creativity, instill a love of learning, and inspire independent thinking and student initiative.

“New York State has thousands of excellent teachers who prepare our students for the future and help them reach their full potential,” Governor Cuomo said when he announced the award in May 2016. “This new program will recognize our most outstanding educators, while supporting their professional growth. I commend all teachers for their dedication to making a difference in the lives of students across the state.”

Each year, the Empire State Excellence in Teaching Program will recognize teachers from 10 different regions of New York, spanning from the North Country to New York City. Public school teachers are eligible to apply for recognition. Any member of the public can nominate a teacher by filling out a recommendation. Teachers who were nominated submitted an application for review by a panel which included:

Catalina Fortino, Vice President of the New York State United Teachers

Michael Mulgrew, President of the United Federation of Teachers

Robert Reidy, Executive Director of the NYS Council of School Superintendents

Bonnie Russell, President of the NYS Parent Teacher Association

Nancy Zimpher, Chancellor of SUNY

Honorees received a $5,000 stipend to support their professional development interests and will also be invited to meet with university, workforce and policy leaders across the state to share their expertise and insights.

Jamie Lerner (BS ‘15) was nominated by Professor Jess Barbagallo to be an Open Arts Research Fellow for a weekend-long workshop exploring questions and issues surrounding the arts.

Emily Schorr Lesnick (ETSS) facilitated workshops on Theatre for Inclusion with teachers from the US & India at edcamps in Ahmedabad and Mumbai while in India on an educators’ trip LINEGlobal. Participants engaged in drama work and discussed how to incorporate theatre into their classrooms. Additionally, Emily co-hosts a live variety show and accompanying podcast called The Soul Glo Project. Soul Glo features established comedic voices and up-and-comers in standup, sketch, improv, music and poetry. Previous guests include SNL writers and performers, Comedy Central performers, and high school students.

Amos Margulies (ETED ’11) is currently teaching 11th grade English at the Community School for Social Justice and extended a residency with The Moth for the third year running. He is also one of TDF’s Open Doors teachers. Their mentor is Alex Dinelaris, who this year won an Academy Award for his movie Birdman, and his new musical On Your Feet is coming to Broadway soon. Amos was recently published in the new Blueprint for Teaching and Learning in Theater (June 2015), in which he co-wrote the addendum on teaching theater to ELLs.

Kristen Tregar (EDTC ’14) will be starting the PhD program in Drama and Theatre at University of California, San Diego this coming fall. In addition, this has been the second year of successful collaboration with Jenny MacDonald, one of the tutors from the Dublin study abroad program. Their respective students in Ireland and the US have been collaborating on devised works. In the spring, the Irish and American students came to NYU for an afternoon workshop where they had the chance to meet Nan Smithner.

In recognition for innovative artistic programming and collaborative leadership highlighting the voice and talents of Steinhardt students, Uproar Theatre Corp was awarded the President’s Service Award.

Uproar Theatre Corps is a student-run Steinhardt club sponsored by the Undergraduate Student Government. Founded and led by undergraduates in the Program in Educational Theatre, Uproar is devoted to sponsoring free workshops, panels, and theatrical competitions which supplement (and complement) Steinhardt coursework. Uproar also creates opportunities for students to write, design, direct, and act, while building a community of student-practitioners. All NYU students (undergrad, masters, and doctoral) are welcome to participate in Uproar events.

Current and Former Faculty and Students Sharon Counts (EDTA ’06), John Del Vecchio (EDTA ’05), Daryl Embry (BS ’05), Emily Kaczmarek (BS ’12), Blake McCarty (EDTC ’08) Jamie Roach (EDTC), Joe Salvatore and Sara Jo Wyllie (ETED ’09) have teamed up for Play/Date, an immersive and voyeuristic theatrical experience set throughout the four levels of Fat Baby, a nightclub and lounge on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. During the performance, the lines between reality and fiction are blurred, allowing guests to view and experience the “show” as it emerges in unlikely ways from unexpected directions.

Durell Cooper (EDTC ’14) was appointed to the position of Program Manager in Educational and Community Partnerships at Lincoln Center Education. In this role, he will be responsible for leading the recruitment of new teaching artist, implementing professional development workshops, and managing the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Kenan Fellowships.”

Andrew M. Gaines (Doctoral Candidate) has been busy presenting at conferences this past spring, including Ethical praxis: At intersection of teaching artistry and creative arts therapy. (NYU’s Forum on the Teaching Artist); The digital mirror: Video drama therapy (American Society of Group Psychotherapy and Psychodrama), and this summer he will chair a symposium with David T. Montgomery, Juliana Saxton, and Ashley Forman entitled, Ethical praxis discourse: Theatre, education, therapy, and activism (American Alliance for Theatre and Education).

Christopher Goslin (EDTC ’10) is going into his second year as the Technical Director and Instructor of Theatre at Florida International University’s Theatre Department in Miami, FL. Previously, he was the Technical Director and Instructor at Miami Dade College in Miami, FL.

Christina Neubrand (EDTC ’06) After four years as the Arts Integration Specialist with Counseling in Schools, Christina recently became the Arts & Leadership Program Manager for The CityKids Foundation.

Donna Kelly Romero (EDTC ’06) received the “To Fill the World with Love” Award from Upper Darby Summer Stage, one of the nation’s oldest and most successful youth theater programs, for “living and teaching the Summer Stage Magic.” Donna has taught acting and storytelling there since 2007. She currently teaches drama and runs the theater program at Friends Select, a Quaker K-12 school in Philadelphia, and serves as a mentor for the Greater Philadelphia Cappies.

John Shorter (EDTH ’93) is very excited to report that his prop rental business is continuing to grow. This January, he moved into his own warehouse space in Ronkonkoma, on Long Island. His company, Prop Rentals NY worked with over 100 schools across the country this school year on props for their shows. Recently, the company expanded to create themed props for weddings, parties and other events.

Sara Simons (Ph.D. ’13) was accepted to participate in an NEH Summer Seminar/Institute, Finding Mississippi in the National Civil Rights Narrative: Struggle, Institution Building, and Power at the Local Level where she will study the civil rights movement with other scholars from around the country.

A month ago, Lamplighters, the Theatre for Young Audiences (TYA) Club at NYU had their annual professional development panel. This year’s panel focused on the significance and importance of storytelling in TYA. The panel consisted of six professionals, five panelists and one moderator, of all varying experiences including teaching artists, artistic directors, teachers, and professional storytellers. After the panelists enjoyed some food, tweeted about the panel and took selfies in the style of Ellen DeGeneres at the Oscars, we were ready to begin.

Jonathan Shmidt-Chapman, adjunct Educational Theatre professor acted as moderator and led the conversation in a very dynamic way.

The panelists jumped into the discussion with fervor answering the question, what engages you in a story? James Miles, adjunct professor in Educational Theatre began the conversation articulating the importance of conflict in a story. As an actor, Miles explained he is often drawn toward comedy and comedy usually works best if there is a conflict at the center of the story. Lauren Jost, artistic director of Spellbound Theatre expressed a conflicting opinion explaining that in her work, creating theatre for the very young does not always need a conflict, but rather should be relatable to children and adult audiences. Spencer Lott, Artistic Manager with Trusty Sidekick Theater, enjoys fantasy that has “roots in reality, but is a little bit warped.” Carolyn Fagan, an Education Programs Manager at The New Victory Theater, likes to laugh. She prefers to listen to stories that make her laugh and occasionally surprise her! Lastly, Laura Simms, internationally acclaimed storyteller, writer and humanitarian, loves to watch a shift in the audience as a story is being presented or performed. With a flood of fascinating and differing opinions, our panel had begun.

Next, Shmidt-Chapman brought up the question of the difference in telling a story to young people versus to adults. Miles was the first to answer this question explaining that he finds great importance in making sure under represented populations are in his stories, aka women, minorities, etc. Lott pointed out the overused idea of creating TYA based upon “what we think that kids will want” rather than challenging kids and realizing that kids live in an adult world and therefore can experience theatre similarly. Simms brought up the criticality of finding what is meaningful for children versus adults and bridging the two. Fagan finalizes the answer to the question describing how kids receive a story as an “explosion.” Kids have a visceral reaction to theatre that is less seen in theatre for adult audiences.

Shmidt-Chapman subsequently brings up the topic of the difference between stories in a classroom and stories in a theatre. When presenting a story in a classroom, you immediately lose the aesthetic frame available in a theatre. Simms reminded us that when a story is told without theatrical or spectacular elements, children are able to “see through the focus of [their] own imagination.” Miles adds that in more intimate settings like classrooms, the young listeners are just as involved as the performers themselves.

So what is the future of storytelling, asks an eager audience member. Carolyn initiates the conversation with the importance of technology. She retorts that technology should be used to our advantage in telling stories to young people. She reminds us that social media is about telling your story about other people’s stories. Shmidt-Chapman brings in an anecdote about a teacher that had his class participate in Show & Tell by finding Youtube videos that they wanted to show and present to the class. This is using technology and today’s social media world to our advantage. Lott adds that young people desire interactivity and we need to interweave interactivity into our work in TYA.

As we wrapped up with this idea of interactivity, Lamplighters members eager to learn more, got a chance to continue the conversation with our panelists over brunch afterwards. It was thrilling to hear professionals in the field of TYA and storytelling talk about their stances on a fairly narrow topic and I could tell it really excited the group of students about the future of this field.

I want to thank our panelists Carolyn Fagan, Lauren Jost, Spencer Lott, James Miles, and Laura Simms along with our moderator Jonathan Shmidt-Chapman for being so gracious with their time and ideas at this panel! On behalf of Lamplighters, we thank you and look forward to another great panel next year.

According to Deborah Hunt, “mankind is a mistake on this earth, but it is only what we create that redeems us.” This was truly inspiring for all of the students who have worked so hard over the course of this trip to enhance their skills in creating something so incredible. Today, the two groups, masks and physical theatre, departed to begin their final rehearsals before the evening performances. Beginning at 10:00am, the physical theatre group took their usual walk to the studio. We continued to refine and strengthened our pieces in preparation for this final “share.” The amount of sweat and tears acquired before lunch could fill our hotel’s unusable swimming pool. It was absolutely amazing to watch this group of talented performers continue to strengthen their craft and perfect such a beautiful work of art. Our only mission was to prove ourselves in this art form, which few of us have experienced before this Puerto Rican adventure. It was an honor to share the field of battle with this group.

It was finally time for the masks and physical theatre groups to share their work and reflect on this amazing experience.

As we left the studio to watch the performance that was to be taking place in the courtyard of the Bellas Artes building, we were met by a masked figure with a bell waiting to guide us.

Once seeing the group of masked figured scattered around the square, I instantly recognized the performers’ dedication and intensity they brought to the piece. We knew we were in for a great show, though strangers enjoying an afternoon coffee had no idea what they were about to experience.

It was clear wearing layer upon layers of black fabric and a mask in 90-degree heat was no easy task, but each performer took on the challenge with ease and created a fantastic show for everyone, including random spectators.

It was then time to return to the studio for the physical theatre group’s final performance. The two weeks we spent creating, devising, collaborating, altering, and adapting all of these pieces finally proved itself to be a terrific gift for all of us on the stage. Like the mask group, we all created something that was uniquely ours, and we were extremely grateful to share it with such fantastic artists. Throughout this performance, each actor highlighted his or her original work and built an ensemble piece with tremendous support and assistance from our director and warrior in training Javier.

Both performances were tremendously successful, and it was finally time to leave the stage and take in our final moments as performers in Puerto Rico.

But that’s not to say we didn’t celebrate afterwards. The program put together a fantastic party in the studio with terrific food and dessert. Being surrounded by music, dancing, and great friends, it was the perfect way to end an incredible day performing an art form that we have all enjoyed.

For this year’s arts education forum, The Program in Educational Theatre at New York University is spotlighting the Teaching Artist. Allied professionals of all disciplines, newcomers to the field, administrators, and researchers are invited to exchange perspectives and collectively envision our shared future alongside leading arts organizations such as New Victory Theater and Lincoln Center Education.

This three-day event will highlight the work of local and international teaching artists through a variety of experiences: dynamic workshops and dialogues with artists representing Roundabout Theatre, AIE Roundtable, The Moth, Urban Arts Partnership, and more; panel discussions around navigation, innovation, and sustainability from cross-disciplinary arts leaders; performances both on campus and at premiere NYC arts venues; and networking opportunities.

Opening night of the forum will include the first ever Exemplary Teaching Artist Awards, celebrating four outstanding leaders in the field of teaching artistry. Nominated by their peers, these individuals are innovators in teaching practice, seasoned guides to teaching artists navigating the field, and experts in sustaining a teaching artist practice. This unique honor will be presented by Dr. Maxine Greene, world-renowned teaching artist pioneer and scholar.

The forum will also feature events such as a teaching artist job fair hosted by Community Word Project and a performance of Julius Caesar by Shakespeare-to-Go, NYU’s traveling Shakespeare troupe. The forum will conclude with an excursion to the New Victory Theater for a pre-show workshop facilitated by New Victory teaching artists, a performance of Fluff: A Story of Lost Toys, and a post-show reception.

For more information and to register for the conference, please go to the Forum Website.

It is with great pride and excitement that we share with you the announcement of Lincoln Center’s first rebranding in history for its education division – rebranded as Lincoln Center Education. With the completion of a $1.2 billion redevelopment of the Lincoln Center campus, this rebrand reflects an unprecedented expansion in the field of arts education by the world’s leading performing arts center.

Announced only recently, and in addition to a new name and a new visual identity (created by Ogilvy & Mather and The Brand Union), Lincoln Center Education (LCE) received $4 Million from the Sherman Fairchild Foundation to add innovative programs to its core work – the largest education grant ever awarded to Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.

Lincoln Center Education’s rebranding arrives after a year-long examination of its existing programs and initiatives. New programs will join established efforts in schools and in the community, reflecting the organization’s updated vision and objectives. Harnessing the resources of Lincoln Center, LCE has realigned itself to most effectively develop arts education programs in five distinct areas:

K-12 education: programs for more than 25,000 students in over 200 schools in the New York metro area.

Higher education: partnerships with local colleges and universities to train teaching candidates in arts education and help recent graduates find employment with school partners.

Community outreach: programs include Poet-Linc, Lincoln Center Local, and other free events such as the monthly Meet the Artist series in the David Rubenstein Atrium, designed to engage the community in the arts and events at and beyond the Lincoln Center campus.

Lincoln Center Institute: LCI is refocused as a dedicated institute within LCE for research in arts education, and training for educators using an arts-based teaching model.

In addition to the work we’ve been doing for over 35 years, we are thrilled to share the following new programs and initiatives:

“Arts in the Middle” – this new pilot program, created in partnership with the New York City Department of Education, is a three- to five-year initiative beginning in the 2013-14 school year to provide arts programming and teacher training at public middle schools which are underserved in the arts, so as to make the arts a lasting part of these schools and their community.

Lincoln Center Education is commissioning a work designed for an audience of children on the autism spectrum.

Lincoln Center Education is expanding the existing Lincoln Center Local program, which brings free Lincoln Center programs to neighborhood libraries in the outer boroughs, and alternative locations such as shelters, senior centers and facilities with incarcerated youths.

Two additional charter schools partnering with the New York City Department of Education and New Visions for Public Schools have opened this fall, making a total of six that are operating to date. LCE expects to ultimately partner on 18 charter schools.

“Next Stage” – Lincoln Center Education is launching a new series of panel discussions, lectures and other programs in the coming months, seeking to generate high-profile discussions on important topics in arts education. This public forum will allow established artists to demonstrate how education has played a role in their work. The initial forums will each be focused on particular arts genres, including dance, music, theater and visual art.

Lincoln Center Education is a global leader in arts education and advocacy and the education cornerstone of Lincoln Center, the world’s largest performing arts complex. As such, LCE is committed to enriching the lives of students, educators, and lifelong learners by providing opportunities for engagement with the highest-quality arts on the stage, in the classroom, digitally, and within the community. Founded in 1975 as the Lincoln Center Institute, LCE has nearly four decades of unparalleled school and community partnerships, professional development workshops, consulting services, and its very own repertory. LCE has reached more than 20 million students, teachers, school administrators, parents, community members, teaching artists, pre-service teachers, university professors, and artists in New York City, across the nation and around the world.

Our new value proposition, which is at the core of everything we do, is as follows:

The arts cultivate a unique skill set that is indispensable for the 21st century: problem solving, collaboration, communication, imagination, and creativity. Lincoln Center, the world’s premier performing arts center, translates those skills from the stage to the lives of children, equipping them for success in their careers and to serve as active participants in their communities. We offer a distinctive approach to education that helps young minds perform in a dynamic world.

We invite you to learn more about our work and the many ways in which you can be a part of it. The Educational Theatre community has given us so much – we look forward to increasing our engagement with the program, its staff, its students and its alumni.

When last summer I got the email announcing I was going to be part of the cast of one of the shows at NYU Steinhardt’s New Plays for Young Audiences, I was thrilled. Of course it’s always exciting to get a positive answer after an audition, but in this case there were a few extra reasons why I wanted to be part of that project. For those of you who don’t know how New Plays for Young Audiences works, it is basically a theatre work in progress based on a new play that is still a working draft. During one week, actors, director, and playwright work together to give the play shape, showing the final result to an audience in a staged reading. This process is extremely helpful for the playwright who gets direct feedback from the actors and can adapt the play based on what is actually working or not working on stage. But as I was saying, this process was also extremely appealing for me for several reasons:

First, being an actress, the opportunity to be part of a work in progress is a challenge. Having to build a character based on a text that changes from one day to the next until the very last minute requires flexibility and technique, and there’s never enough of that for an actor, right?

That process becomes even more fulfilling by having the playwright on stage, working with the actors, explaining, listening, and re-writing. That is an amazing experience! How many times, reading a script, I would have paid to have the chance to ask the author, “Why?” Well, New Plays for Young Audiences gave me that for free!

Third, I would add that being a writer myself, observing the creative process of another playwright always gives food for thought. And having the opportunity to be part of that process, feeding back to the author from the actor’s perspective, is also an experience every playwright should have at least once.

This project also gave me the chance to work under the direction of Deirdre Lavrakas, from the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. I guess anyone with some experience in theatre would agree with me about how much we actors learn by watching a director at work. And in this particular case, the lesson was even bigger because the director had to be flexible enough to adapt the show to the new version of the script in every rehearsal!

Probably one of the things that motivated me the most was the outstanding cast I shared the stage with. Most of the actors were related to the Program in Educational Theatre at NYU Steinhardt, so our rehearsals were a reflection of what that program is: a perfectly balanced combination of artistic talent and human touch. It is always a pleasure to work on stage with talented people who know how to listen, share, and create to build the best show possible.

Finally… lets be very honest with this: New Plays for Young Audiences happens at the Provincetown Playhouse in NYC, where Anne Bancroft, Julie Harris, Eugene O’Neill, and Bette Davis launched their careers. And yes, it’s not a bad reward to add my name to that list!

This summer I got an elephant tattooed on my ankle. It is a permanent representation of the life-changing summer that I had doing both Educational Theatre summer abroad programs in London and Dublin. Students who had done the programs before told me to take advantage of the study abroad programs, so I applied with excitement but didn’t really know what to expect.

As last school year ended I was feeling frustrated with myself as a teacher, was losing some of my drive, and knew that I needed to grow professionally and step up my game. That is where this summer came in. The trip was filled with experiences that can’t be done justice on paper. In London we delved deeply into process drama through workshops with David Booth, Cecily O’Neill, Philip Taylor, and a myriad of other experts in the field at the International Drama Educators Conference: Heathcote Reconsidered, in Greenwich! We travelled to Sidcup, England to partner with Rose Bruford College where we worked with Jeremy Harrison and learned about actor musicianship and how to use it for educational theater purposes. Mr. Harrison had such a fresh look at educational theater and added many new tricks to our toolboxes. We also went to theatre shows in the evenings which reminded me about the power of theater in all forms, commercial or non.

Ireland was a very different experience but equally life-changing. From learning about devising work by performing created pieces on the streets of Belfast to learning how to come into a community as an outsider, the Ireland program really caused me to look deeply at my theater practice. You cannot go through the Ireland program without feeling the deep importance of theater work in ALL communities! Living at Trinity College is truly special, knowing that every step takes you on a journey through history.

Out at Sidcup for a day of workshops with Jeremy Harrison. Pictured: Abigail Screer, Katharine McSherry, Emily Tinawi, and Janet Chia-En Lee.

Both Professor Taylor and Professor Salvatore clearly cared about us, our learnings, and ensuring that we had unforgettable experiences. I know that I will be a better teacher because of them. Beyond the academic learnings, I made life-time friends. There isn’t a day that I don’t Facebook/snapchat/email/text/call one of the many new friends that I acquired over the summer. When people look at my ankle they only see an elephant. When I look at my ankle I see a reminder of two of the best months of my life.

——————————

For over 30 years, the program in Educational Theatre has offered unique opportunities for concentrated study and daily field participation in the uses of theatre education and applied theatre which are designed for teachers, teaching artists, university students, recreational leaders, language and speech arts specialists, theatre directors, actors, integrated arts educators, and community leaders.

Post navigation

Welcome to Revue

Welcome to the official blog of the program in Educational Theatre at New York University. The Program in Educational Theatre was founded in 1966 and since that time has provided opportunities for students to develop artistry in traditional and non-traditional performance spaces. In Educational Theatre, we are theatre makers—and regardless of the population with whom we collaborate, whether it is teachers or students or members of a community, the essence of our work is to do with art and process. This blog shares ideas, stories, articles and the latest information from the field of Educational Theatre, where art-making meets education.